Heritage
by Drinking Again
Summary: With Lyla's discovery of latent, uncontrollable powers, and Sirena tiring of lying to David, the mermaids' secret has never been more volatile. As the arrival of a world-renowned scientist raises tensions, however, they hardly have time to care about the return of Cam's father, a man whose mysteries and secrets may well prove to be the most dangerous threat of all.
1. Chapter 1: Uncertainty

**A/N: Because I don't have enough Mako ffs going at the moment (note: heavy sarcasm). What can I say- doing one-shot after one-shot has made me crave continuous plot, which coupled with my rising Zyla shipping has resulted in this. The summary will be rewritten whenever I summon the creative skills required. I like to reread it and then just sit there and bathe in how melodramatic it sounds. **

**This chapter is fairly irritatingly enigmatic, but I promise that Chapter Two will bring more explanations than questions. **

**The pairings in this will be the usual: Zyla, CamNixie, and DavidSirena, although one of those pairings is more in danger than the others. I hope you enjoy :)**

* * *

**Chapter One: Uncertainty**

Cam

Cam really ought to thank the others; After all, because of them he was becoming an excellent cook.

No longer spending his evenings over at Zac's binging on takeouts and screwing around on his x-box, Cam now spent most of his free time at home with his mother. It was a pretty sad reality, but better than the alternative. The problem was that there was no longer anyone for him to go out _with_, and parading himself around outside alone just made the isolation worse. At least at home he could pretend that the outside world wasn't the living hell it had become.

And so, with nothing better to do, Cam had taken on the duty of cooking dinner every night. His mother worked late most evenings, so she'd never been a great candidate for family dinners anyway. As for Cam's father, the man was never around, perpetually off on business trips, although what exactly it was that he did Cam would never know.

Before Cam's betrayal, if he ever had been home from Zac's apartment in the evenings, his mother would normally just shove something in the microwave and zap it, 'ready in under five minutes' just like the packets promised. Cam had never minded, but had also known that she wished she could put more time into raising him and doing normal, everyday things like cooking dinner. So, to relieve her of the guilt, he'd started making it instead. Considering how she was the only company he had left, it seemed a wise idea to take good care of her.

One evening, just over a month after Cam had stolen the Trident, Cam was calmly stirring a wooden spoon in a saucepan of simmering chilli when the phone rang. "I'll get it," his mother called from the front door, having just arrived home. She hurried through into the kitchen, her blonde hair coming loose in flyaway strands from its bun. Giving Cam a quick smile she made a dash for the phone, which was located right before the stove where Cam was cooking, perfectly within his reach. "Don't want to disturb you and your cooking," she explained with a small smile as she picked up the phone. "That smells delicious."

Turning her back on Cam, his mother walked briskly off out of the kitchen into the entrance hall, still not having pressed the answer button on the receiver. Her attempts at hiding the phone call from him were hardly subtle, and so with a mix of suspicion and curiosity Cam turned down the radio volume so that he could eavesdrop on the conversation.

"Hi honey," his mother said softly, her voice quiet, and yet even from the kitchen Cam could still hear the waves of emotion layered through it. She sounded gentle, affectionate, but to his ears the warmth seemed tinged with pain. Call it a son's intuition or whatever, but he'd always possessed a knack for being able to tell when his mother was upset or despondent. In her whispered answer, there was a particular brand of sadness worked into her voice that gave away the caller.

His father.

"Yes, yes, I know, I got your message," his mother continued, and Cam could hear her footsteps as she paced up and down the corridor. "No, I didn't want to tell him until you were sure. You know how disappointed he gets when you cancel. Yes. You're sure this time?" His mother posed the question with a sharp scepticism that Cam had heard develop in her over time, building with each promised visit his father failed to attend.

There was a pause, and then a sigh of relief. "Oh honey, he'll be so happy. I'm so happy. That's brilliant news. Yes. Yes, I'll go tell him. I love you." And then the phone clicked off and the house fell quiet.

Cam's mother returned to the kitchen with the phone cradled to her chest like a long-lost, recently found precious object. Her eyes were distant, dropped to the floor, and a small, unconscious smile lined her lips. Cam knew what that look entailed, and he froze in response, his body tensing rigid with a fear he wished he'd grown out of by now.

"Oh Cam," his mother said with a sigh, finally raising her eyes to meet him, "I've got such wonderful news."

"Dad's coming back," Cam said flatly, cutting her off. He hated when she got like this, the hope in her eyes and the lovesick smile nauseating. She never seemed to learn that no matter what her husband said, he'd never keep to his promises. They hadn't seen him in over a year- how long would he have to stay away until she realised what a bastard he was?

"Yes," his mother said, and her dreamy expression dissolved at the bitterness in Cam's voice. "Yes, he is Cam. And I know that in the past he's let us down on that hope before, but it's different this time."

"That's what you always say," Cam said, feather quiet, barely audible. He knew that he sounded like a brat whenever he spoke of his father, but the alternative was living like his mother, filled with pointless hope, waiting for it to be shattered for the hundredth time. His way was safer.

"I know I do, but this time it really is Cam. This time, he's not just coming down for the weekend. Cam, you're father is moving back home, to stay."

Saying nothing, Cam stirred the chilli. It was threatening to boil over and would burn soon if he didn't turn down the heat. He kept on stirring. "To stay," he repeated, smirking like it was a bad joke.

"Yes Cam, to stay," his mother said firmly, a spike of frustration peaking in her voice. She didn't seem to appreciate him ruining her fairytale ending.

"Right."

Exhaling shortly, his mother disappeared briefly and then returned with her briefcase clutched in one hand. She came over to Cam's side of the kitchen counter and then set the case down next to him, unzipping it. From within she withdrew a thin paper folder. "Here," she said, handing him the papers before reaching over and turning down the heat on the hob he was using. "You go read these, and I'll take care of the chilli. Deal?"

Still refusing to speak out of sulky protest, Cam reluctantly took the folder she'd offered him and handed over the spoon. He shuffled off to the kitchen table, scuffing his feet as he walked, and then took a seat, dropping the folder down on the table with a loud '_whump_'.

Flicking open the folder, Cam slid out the papers it contained with a purposeful air of disinterest, casting his eyes across them dismissively. Then his blasé act faltered and he leaned closer, staring. He leafed through the rest of the papers, checking each one for some kind of catch. No loopholes could be found.

His father's transfer papers seemed one hundred percent absolute, even the finer details such as his new income sorted out. "Your father will be working locally from now on. He's got a contract down here for a minimum of eighteen months," Cam's mother narrated aloud from the stove, humming as she worked. "There'll be no more trips abroad, no more being stationed at some post that's god knows where. He's going to live here, with us."

Unable to believe that it was true, Cam checked and rechecked the papers detailing his father's transfer and new job position, waiting with increasing panic to find the loophole, his father's way out. No way could he be staying there, in their house, with them.

"Aren't you excited, Cam?" His mother asked quietly, and he could hear in her voice how his response had hurt her.

"Yeah," Cam lied, feeling sick to his stomach. "And he's staying here in this house, with us?"

"Yep," his mother confirmed gleefully, smiling as she swayed back and forth to the tune of her humming. "He'll be here waiting for you when you get back from school tomorrow. We're all going out for a family meal as a welcome home treat; I'll book us in somewhere really nice, I promise."

"Great," Cam mumbled, looking down at the papers and the big red stamp of 'TRANSFERED' emblazoned across the front page. So now even home was no longer safe, a haven from his problems outside. The ones inside were going to be far worse.

* * *

Lyla

There were many occasions upon which Lyla felt the deep, compelling urge to fight Nixie, so to be _allowed_ to do such a thing was pretty much her idea of heaven.

"God, you are so slow," Nixie jeered from behind her, cackling before disappearing again.

That day for class, Rita had taken the three girls out to Mako Island for a bit of practical survival training. They'd ventured into the most tangled depths of the Island's forest, ensuring that their tracks were covered and the way was sealed, until Rita had finally called for them to come to a halt. "Today," she'd said, a smile that was far too devilish for a normal teacher playing upon her lips, "you're going to get a bit of practical experience.

"Nixie, Lyla, I want you two to go first. You have the whole of the marked area within which to practice," Rita said. She gestured to where she had used her powers to seal off the rest of the Island with vegetation so as not to be interrupted. "The aim of this exercise is a balance of self-defence and attack, so that you have confidence in both skills should the situation ever demand it."

"Wait, you're letting me fight her? Like, actually fight her? No lectures or punishments involved?" Nixie said incredulously, jabbing her thumb in Lyla's direction to gesture to her.

"Yes Nixie, I am. But the two of your are to remember that this is only a simulation, and in reality you two are friends," Rita reminded them sternly, her teacher demeanour and voice returning. "You will not be using your powers on one another directly, but rather to manipulate your surroundings to your advantage. The aim is to incapacitate your opponent, not harm them. If I think that things are getting out of hand then you will be stopped immediately. Being able to control your powers is just as important as being able to use them."

"Yes Miss Santos," Lyla and Nixie said in unison, Nixie rolling her eyes whilst Lyla just smirked. Having a proper head to head with Nixie was exactly what she felt like doing that morning, feeling unusually restless and in need of a good venting session. It was simply unfortunate that Nixie would have to be on the receiving end of that requirement.

And so with Sirena and Miss Santos sat up on the hillside, watching over them, Lyla and Nixie had been let loose on one another.

"Oh, slow am I?" Lyla retorted, spinning around to see where Nixie had spoken from. She'd vanished, and Lyla was quickly discovering that Nixie had been holding out during training sessions. She'd never known that the brunette possessed such advanced camouflage skills, completely invisible in the surroundings of trees, rocks and vines.

Crouching down low, Lyla moved her hand through the air and with it great reams of plants sprang up, shielding her from view. She needed to get a better idea of where Nixie had vanished to before she could attack. If only they were allowed to harm one another, this would be a heck of a lot easier.

Before she'd settled on a plan, however, she became aware that something cold was dripping on her. Looking up, she saw that Nixie had summoned a raincloud directly above her, raining down upon her skin. Lyla barely had time to register this fact, however, before she felt a tingling sensation and fell backwards.

"Nixie, that's cheating," she yelled furiously, giving an indignant flip of her tail, which was useless on land.

"Nixie used her powers wisely, Lyla. That's perfectly within the rules," Rita called out from her perch up on the hillside, well within ear shot.

"See," Nixie's disembodied voice jeered from out in the darkness of the forest, "told you I was better at this than you."

Scowling, her restlessness quickly bubbling up into white-hot fury, Lyla prepared to defend herself. Nixie thought she had won, so now doubt she would get cocky and reveal herself to get some last minute mockery in. When she did, Lyla would be ready.

Glancing around, she spotted three small rocks coated in moss lying beside her, hidden amongst her newly grown reeds. Extending her hand towards them, Lyla gently lifted them into the air. She then levitated several others, bringing them all to hover around her, spinning in carefully controlled circles to form a cloud of rocks around her.

Let Nixie see if she was so very confident when she found Lyla surrounded by rocks, all ready to attack her. Not that Lyla was really intending on hurting Nixie, certainly not by throwing rocks at her, she wasn't _that_ much of a psychopath, but she'd love to see the Nixie's face when she thought she was about to lose, painfully.

"So, finally ready to admit how slow you are?" Nixie teased, brushing her way through the vegetation, drawing into sight. Her cocky grin faltered, however, when she spotted the numerous hovering rocks all around Lyla.

"Hey, Nixie," Lyla said calmly, her own smile positively wicked, "finally ready to admit how slow you are?" In an act of mock theatrics, she jolted the rocks so that they appeared for a moment to be hurtling towards Nixie, before catching them, bringing them to a stop.

Nixie, however, didn't know that Lyla wasn't really a psychopath and that she wasn't really going to hurt her. Her face awash with terror and anger, the brunette stretched her arms out and yanked the rocks out from Lyla's control, into hers. She drew them back, hoisting them higher into the air. Still acting on instinct, she spun them round and sent them flying right back at Lyla.

Lyla barely heard Rita's scream of, "Nixie, no! Don't!" Over the sound of her own racing heartbeat, blood pumping in her ears. Panic overtook her, and in one last helpless attempt to protect herself she flung her arm out towards the rocks, turning her head aside, unable to look. What she was trying to do she didn't know, anything would have been nice, anything that could stop her from dying.

There was a bright flash of green, and then came a series of loud cracking noises that resonated across the forest, so loud that surely all of Mako had heard.

Breathing rapidly, on the verge of hyperventilating, Lyla slowly turned back around to witness what had happened.

All around her, the shattered remains of rocks littered the ground, reduced to nothing more than dust. Not one had hit her, although some of the dust now coated her tail.

Stood just before her, Nixie stared on, her eyes wide with shock, and for once the mermaid was speechless. No witty comebacks, no jokes, nothing.

"Lyla, Nixie!" Called the voice of Sirena, who had dashed down from the hillside just after Nixie had started to turn the rocks on Lyla. She broke into the clearing, flushed in the face and out of breath, but still able to witness the aftermath of the fight.

"What happened?" She asked, staring around at the crumbled rock.

"Lyla, Nixie, Sirena. Stay right where you are," Rita ordered from up on the hillside. She spoke the command with absolute authority, and yet it did not quite mask the way in which her voice shook. The girls all looked at one another. If Rita was frightened, then what the hell did that mean for them?

Moments later Rita pushed through the tangled bushes and joined them in the small clearing, her eyes immediately going to the rocks. She covered her mouth with her hand, falling still, and simply took in the sight for a moment.

"What was that?" Sirena asked, looking between the three of them. "All I saw was a bright flash of green light, and then I heard the cracking."

"Whatever it was, it wasn't mermaid," Nixie said coldly, and she now watched Lyla, her eyes narrowed with caution. "Certainly not like anything mermaid I've ever seen before."

"Rita?" Sirena asked, fidgeting uncomfortably at the accusation in Nixie's tone. She looked over at their adoptive aunt with nervous hope, awaiting the denial of Nixie's statement and the assurance that everything was alright. Unfortunately, the adult mermaid could not give it.

"We need to get home. Now," Rita said after several more tense moments of silence, finally awakening from her reverie.

"But-" all three girls said together.

"No buts. Sirena, Nixie, help Lyla dry off. I'll meet you all back by the shore."

Without a second word to any of them Rita turned on her heel. She gave a practiced flick of her hand and all their artificially created vegetation wilted into the ground, clearing the way. With that, she left.

"Something's wrong," Sirena said, stating the obvious as she crouched down by Lyla. "Something's really wrong if even Aunt Rita's scared like that."

"Yeah, something's wrong alright," Nixie seconded, and still her eyes were fixed on Lyla. She hadn't joined Sirena by her side, still standing, her arms folded across her chest protectively. "What was that Lyla? First you try to kill me, then _that_?"

"I wasn't trying to kill you," Lyla snapped back irritably, although in truth she was more terrified than angry. She herself had no idea what the green flash had been, but the nagging voice in her head was telling her that she had caused it. "The rocks were just a trick to make you stop, so I had a chance to get you back."

"And the green light? The rocks breaking?" Nixie continued, demanding answers.

"I don't know, alright?" Lyla said, focusing on drying herself off to avoid meeting the others' eyes. "I don't know."

Chewing her bottom lip, Nixie mulled over Lyla's words for a moment before relenting, coming to sit beside her and help dry off her tail. "Rita knows," she said quietly, watching as Lyla's scales poured off steam.

"Think she'll tell us?" Lyla asked, nodding gratefully at Nixie for the help. In that moment of uncertainty, she no longer felt the urge to hit Nixie, rather the wish to keep her close. She felt as though she were going to need all the friends she could get to get through this, whatever _this_ was.

"She'll have to," Nixie said, drawing back as Lyla's legs reformed. "Because whatever it is, it's going to be trouble. For all of us."

* * *

**A/N: So, I hope my addiction to cliffhangers hasn't made you grind your teeth too much. This will hopefully be updated once a week on average, and please, if you enjoyed, feel free *nudge wink nudge* to review :P **


	2. Chapter 2: Who We Are

**A/N: So, I actually stuck to my promise of answering questions, although I'll confess there's still some explaining to be done with Cam and his dear papa. I hope you enjoy the second instalment of this story. The next chapter won't be coming for a bit since I have another request to work on, but I'll update ASAP. **

**And thanks to The Swimming Kitten for being awesome and awesomely nice with her reviews :) If you haven't already, go and check out her Mako story 'Forgotten' because it's awesome, and it has so much dramatic tension that you will be unable to stop reading/waiting for the next chapter to come out. **

* * *

**Chapter Two: Who We Are**

Lyla

"Nixie was right," Rita said as she paced up and down around the grotto, subconsciously biting in apprehension at her nails. "The cause of this isn't mermaid."

Sat down beside the pool that ran off from the grotto's floor, the three girls looked up at Rita, their eyes following her as she moved about the room. "Then… what was it?" Lyla asked, feeling that she was entitled to an answer. It had, after all, been her who had caused the green light and the shattering rocks. If whatever had caused that hadn't been mermaid, then what the hell was it?

Ceasing her pacing, Rita turned to look at her, still chewing at her nails. She didn't answer immediately, her eyes assessing Lyla, studying her with a caution that she'd never shown before. It did little to help Lyla's nerves.

"I've seen this kind of magic only once before, but it's not something you easily forget," Rita said, her eyes unblinking and wide, distant, looking right through the girls, seeing another time, another place. "No matter how hard you try."

"Okay Aunt Rita, the cryptic mystery is starting to freak us out," Nixie said with a nervous laugh and smile, looking at the other two for support. "Mind telling us what exactly is going on?"

Her eyes briefly flickering over to regard Nixie, Rita paused again before nodding, removing her hand from her mouth. "Yes. I apologise girls, I understand that this must be harder for you than for me." She ran her fingers back through her hair, tucking a few loose strands behind her ear before nodding.

"Lyla, I need to ask you: Has anything like this ever happened before?" Rita asked. Down below, Lyla felt her hands curling into tight fists at her sides. Still Rita had not told them what was going on. Now hardly seemed like the time for questions.

"No," she answered shortly, speaking honestly. "I don't even know what happened, which is why I need you to tell me."

"I'm sorry if I seem to be being purposefully ambiguous Lyla, it's just… it's not news you have to deliver every day," Rita said sheepishly, and she took the steps down to their level. She stood directly before Lyla, looking down at her. Her face had adopted the gentle, apologetic expression that she always used when delivering bad news to her students, trying to comfort them as much as possible. Lyla only felt herself tense up in response, knowing that no good could come from that expression.

"Do any of you girls know what a sea witch is?" Rita asked them. Lyla felt sick.

"Yes," she said quickly, before any of the other girls could answer. "They're a race of mammal-fish hybrids, not dissimilar to mermaids, who have long been banished from the blue waters. They dwell in the darkest depths of the ocean, down where no light reaches, and are forbidden from rising."

"Well recalled," Rita praised her, although the warmth in her voice was more sympathetic than proud. "And do you know why they were banished?"

"They were considered too dangerous. They were the only threat that mermen and mermaids ever joined forces against. Even now that they're in exile people fear them," Lyla reeled off the information without missing a beat. With each sentence her voice raised up a semitone in pitch, gradually climbing higher until she sounded somewhat hysterical.

"Yes," Rita said gently, "and with good reason too. When I was still in a pod… we suffered an attack from a group of sea witches. There were only three of them, and yet nearly half our numbers were wiped out. They make quite the fearsome enemy."

"Are you saying I'm a sea witch?" Lyla demanded, feeling more than a touch defensive. "Because in case you haven't noticed, I have a tail just like yours, and my powers are mermaid. My mother was a mermaid; Nixie and Sirena can attest to that. I'm no sea witch."

"Lyla, that green light, that's the mark of sea witch magic," Rita said, trying to be gentle whilst reinforcing her point. "There have been cases in the past of hybrid children, born to mermaid and sea witch parents. Unlike with merkind, the sea witches still have a population evenly split between males and females. It's not unheard of for desperate mermaids to seek a sea witch male in pursuit of motherhood. Normally though the children are born deformed or sickly. One has never survived to grow to your age."

"That's because I'm _not_ a sea witch," Lyla said through gritted teeth, glaring back at Rita. "I'm a mermaid just like you three. One mishap with my powers and you want to start a witch hunt?"

"I'm not denying that you're a mermaid, Lyla," Rita said, and she dropped down to her knees so that she was kneeling before her. Tenderly, she took Lyla's hands in her own, treating her like fragile glass. Lyla hated the way she acted as though someone had died. "But that kind of magic can be caused by only one thing. Lyla, you are part sea witch."

Standing up, brushing Rita's hands from hers, Lyla felt the desperate urge to scream. Nixie would never let her live it down, however, so instead she just glowered and kept silent, biting back her shouts. "I'm not," she hissed, glaring down at Rita, who still sat on her knees before her. "I'm not a- a _monster_."

"I beg to differ," Nixie said dryly from besides her, raising an eyebrow at Lyla's loss of temper.

Once again feeling the urge to hit Nixie, Lyla clenched her hands at her side and then shoved past Rita, hurrying over to the pool's edge. "I'm going for a swim," she said shortly, raising her hands above her head into a diving position.

"Try not to kill anyone," Nixie shouted from behind her. Mentally cursing the brunette to the bottom of the ocean, Lyla gave her no reply and dived in, disappearing beneath the waters.

"That went well I thought," Nixie said after a moment, sighing and leaning back in her seat.

"Nixie, you shouldn't have said those things to her," Sirena hissed, shocked by her friend's behaviour.

"What else was I supposed to say?" Nixie said. "She wouldn't want me treating her any differently just because she's a sea witch now. I was just trying to show her that to me, she's still the same straight-laced psychopath as she's always been."

"How very thoughtful of you Nixie," Rita said, looking flatly at the brunette before her. "But Lyla is going to need more than your snarky commentary to get through this. If I am right and she does indeed possess sea witch blood, then the following months are going to be the most difficult yet. Do you two know why we consider sea witches so dangerous?"

"Because they nearly kill their friends with rocks, and then make those rocks explode?" Nixie guessed.

"Close," Rita said. "There was a time, long ago, when sea witches and merfolk co-existed. It was quickly found, however, that sea witches were too volatile. Their powers are far less easily managed than ours, and about ten times as powerful. Not only that, but they can be used for far more devious purposes. You've all seen the land-film 'The Little Mermaid', yes?"

"Yeah, Zac made us watch it last week," Nixie said with a disgruntled sort of shrug. "It wasn't that great. Mermaid girl sacrifices everything for land-boy. Pretty stupid moral messages in it."

"Oh, but the songs were so beautiful," Sirena interjected, and it was clear from her wide, starry-eyed smile that she'd enjoyed it. "And the art was so gorgeous. I wish I could draw like that."

"Yes, well, art and singing aside, do you remember Ursula, the sea witch?"

"The octopus drag queen?" Nixie said, and upon receiving a curious glance from Rita she explained, "That's what Zac called her anyway."

"Well, yes, her. She's actually a fairly accurate depiction of sea witches in a way, especially for humans. Sea witches were treated similarly to her; exiled, but called upon in times of need. To do business with them was highly frowned upon, however, rather like the human concept of doing a deal with the devil. The consequences of their magic could lead to high prices having to be paid."

"So… Lyla is now an evil drag queen octopus who's going to steal our voices and slash or our souls?" Nixie summarised, frowning at the conclusion.

"No, of course not," Rita snapped, growing impatient with Nixie's jokes. "She's still Lyla."

Sighing, Rita pinched the bridge of her nose and tried to make the girls see sense. "The powers of sea witches often lie dormant until late adolescence. Once they become active, however, they are a nightmare to control. More often than not, someone dies in the process of a sea witch learning to master his or her powers. You must all be prepared to help Lyla in this difficult time, but you must also remember to be cautious around her. Whilst she is still your friend and she requires your help, she now poses a serious threat to all of you."

"So what, we give her lots of hugs, big smiles, and encouragement, but just make sure that there's a twenty foot gap between us?" Nixie said. "Because somehow I think she'll notice if we all start treating her like she's going to explode at any second."

Beside her, Sirena had fallen very quiet, looking down at her hands.

"What I'm saying," Rita said, speaking slowly to emphasise her point, "is that she's dangerous."

* * *

Cam

If you ever saw Cam's parents stand side by side, it was pretty obvious from whom he'd inherited his dashingly good looks.

His mother was a short woman, lean and yet she managed to look slightly dumpy regardless, possessing a homely, curvy sort of frame. She shared Cam's hair in texture and colour, and she wore hers tied up more often than not. He'd inherited his triangular nose from her, his square jaw, the grey-blue of his eyes, and even his signature goofy smile had been, that's right, you guessed it, all thanks to her stunning set of genes. Whilst her smile was perhaps seen less often, when they both stood side by side sharing a joke, the relation was undeniable.

How to describe his father? Cam had once summarised his father rather neatly as child. They'd been asked in class one day to write a poem about their fathers. The teachers had received all the typical titles: 'My Hero', 'World's Coolest Dad', and even 'My Dad Once Killed A Man'. The one they were most concerned by, however, was Cam's.

He'd entitled his 'Scary'.

His mother had then spent the rest of the evening hurriedly assuring Cam's teachers that no, he was not being abused at home, and no, his father did not hit him. Even if his father had been a violent man, he was never around to carry out the beatings anyway.

His teachers had treated him like fragile porcelain for the rest of the year.

The man who stood in the entrance hall upon Cam's return home from school could, in all fairness, be neatly described as 'Scary'. He was a huge man, pushing well past six-foot and with a flawless posture to emphasise it. As a younger man he had been a block of muscle, and although he had thinned with age he still did not look like an individual you would be wise to pick a fight with.

His demeanour was no less intimidating. His face was angular, grim, his dark eyes piercing and unforgiving. He stood with his back straight like a solider called to attention, his hands clasped before him. He wore his greying hair cropped short and dressed smartly, although he lacked any decorative pieces or anything impractical. As far as Cam's experience went, he rarely spoke and never smiled.

He was not a man Cam was fond of.

"Father," Cam said stiffly, nodding to his father in the respectful manner he had been taught since birth. He might not like the man, but that did not mean he was stupid enough to piss him off. That was a boundary even Cam knew not to push.

"Cam," his father replied in the same fashion, inclining his head.

"Oh, Cam!" His mother called in headless excitement from the kitchen, dashing through to join them in the entrance. Her work clothes had been replaced with her best dress, and her hair was tied up in some sort of complex knot. She wore make-up, a rare occurrence, and stretched across her lips was the half-shy goofy smile that could be easily spotted in her son. "You're back."

Rather out of the ordinary, his mother came forwards and hugged him, squeezing him tightly. "Mum," Cam groaned in awkward protest. Normally he'd hug her back, but he felt unable to do so under the watchful gaze of his father.

"Come on, hurry up upstairs and go get changed. I want you looking smart for our welcome back dinner," his mother ordered him briskly, releasing him and dusting off his shoulders. "What on earth did you do to your hair?" She asked, picking at it.

"Nothing. It was just one of Zac's pranks," Cam said quietly, looking aside, praying his father somehow hadn't heard.

"Oh," his mother said, deflating slightly. Withdrawing her hand from fiddling with his hair –which sat in a tangled mess upon his head, completely soaked- she didn't seem to know what to do with herself for a moment. "He's been pulling a lot of those recently, hasn't he?"

"He's just screwing around mum, it's what friends do," Cam said with his best attempt at their family goofy smile, brushing her off. "I'll go get changed."

"No, you won't," his father said, breaking through their moment of familial uncertainty. His dark eyes rested on Cam.

"But George, I_ need_ him to go get changed. Our reservation is in less than an hour," Cam's mother said with a smile, glancing back at her husband. She showed none of the fear Cam felt, but then she'd always been blind when it came to her husband. She never found a look from his eyes feeling like an icy chill, or his words eliciting the sensation of a knife twisting in her stomach. After all, she'd married him.

"I need to speak with him first," Cam's father said. His voice had barely changed, and yet something within it clearly said that he was not to be questioned.

"George," Cam's mother said anyway, putting her hands on her hips, giving him _the look_. It was the thing that Cam admired most about her, the fact that no matter how lovesick she acted around him, she was still unafraid to give his father _the look_. Cam cracked under it every time, but his father was another matter.

"I'll be quick, I promise," his father said, his lips pulling up in what was his equivalent of a smile.

"Men," Cam's mother said despairingly, coming forward and giving her husband a quick kiss on the cheek before walking back through to the kitchen, muttering to herself in exasperation at her beloved.

She didn't seem realise the significance of the fact that she'd just left Cam alone with him.

"Cam," his father said again, curtly. "Follow me."

Turning on his heel, his father walked down the entrance hallway. Instead of going through into the living space, however, he stopped short when he reached the end of the hallway. Rotating once more, he then faced the door set into the back of the stairwell, which lead down to the basement, or what was more commonly referred to as his study.

Even when his father was away for yearlong journeys, the basement always stayed his study. He kept it locked securely, and always took the keys away with him whenever he left. Cam had never been down there, and he'd certainly never seen his mother go down there. Whenever he'd asked her about it, she'd simply given him a tight smile and had shaken her head. Cam knew that that meant they'd fought over the subject, and she'd lost.

Now though, Cam's father brought out the key, which hung on a chain around his neck, and started releasing the three locks that bolted the basement door shut. As a child, Cam had always been desperate to go down there, but in later years he'd developed an uneasy fear of it. He'd realised that the chance to witness his father's demons was not one he should desire.

To now be faced with the knowledge that he was finally going to find out what lurked down there made his father's return no less daunting. He had half a mind to call out for his mother, to cry out, 'Look mum! He's opening the basement.' He couldn't explain it, but he knew that his father did not wish for his mother to join them down there. If she returned, no doubt the door would be hurriedly locked back up and they could go out for their evening of strained conversation and unspoken resentments. That sounded like heaven compared to this.

"Rose, we'll just be outside for a bit," Cam's father called out to his mother, confirming his suspicions that was what to follow was not for her to witness.

"Alright. Be quick!" She yelled back from the kitchen, and Cam could hear the faint sound of her humming innocently along to the radio.

"Follow me, and keep your voice down," Cam's father instructed, turning his cold gaze on him when he spoke. He then opened up the basement door and held it there for Cam to enter in first.

Moving hesitantly, pointlessly trying to delay what was to come, Cam shuffled in through the door, squinting in the darkness. His father moved in behind him and quickly dead-bolted the door shut, blocking out their only source of light. "Hold onto the banister and continue down. There's a switch on your right at the bottom," his father said, a touch of impatience in his tone.

Obeying without question, not wanting to anger his father now that he was locked underground with him, Cam felt around for a railing in the pitch-black darkness. He found it and wrapped his hand securely around the cold, rough surface of the wood. He took each step carefully, feeling his way down with his foot before putting any weight on it. He could hear his father following behind him, each one of his footsteps steady, confident, and well accustomed to the darkness.

When he found that there were no more steps exceeding him, Cam grasped around on the wall beside him for a switch. Finding it, he flicked it down and then turned, looking around to finally discover what it was that his father had kept hidden away down there all those years.

He felt like he was going to faint.

Illuminated in the golden-orange glow of the naked filament bulb, long shadows were cast across everything. The walls of the basement were covered in wooden panelling, making the small, square area resemble the inside of a shed. Multiple sets of finely-crafted mechanical bows and arrows were displayed upon the wall, lending to the appearance of a hunting hut. And that wasn't even mentioning the prizes that were mounted there.

On the far wall, a long, scaly body had been severed, stuffed and preserved, nailed carefully to a shiny mahogany backboard. The scales had dulled with time, now a mottled brown, and the flesh that poked out from underneath the end of the tail had turned white with post-mortem pallor. Regardless of these small alterations, or the fact that it was missing a torso and a head, however, Cam still recognised it.

The tail mounted upon the wall looked exactly like Nixie's.

"Cam," his father said quietly, his voice a low, deep whisper, "have you ever seen a mermaid?"

* * *

**A/N: Thoughts, feelings, violent physical reactions? Even if you just want to rant at me and tell me what a horrideous scumbag I am, feel free to drop me a review down below. See yah next chapter!**


	3. Chapter 3: Demons

**A/N: Thank you to everyone who's been reviewing, glad to know I have you on tenterhooks, and I hope that this chapter lives up to your expectations. As a forewarning, no, I don't apologise for the blatant abuse of melodramatic mystery. *cackles* **

**I hope you enjoy!**

* * *

**Chapter Three: Demons**

Cam

"What?" Cam whispered, the word hollow in his throat. Surely it all just had to be a bad dream. Soon, he'd wake up.

"I know that it's hard to believe Cam, but you can witness it with your own eyes," his father said with little emotion aside from terse impatience.

Walking out from behind Cam, his father moved to circle the room, touching his fingers to the paper files on his desk and to the weapons that rested on the walls. The way Cam's father moved had always unnerved him, yet it was strangely hypnotic to watch. His steps were none short in confidence or purpose, and yet he moved lightly, gracefully, alternating between fast and slowly like a shadow catching on surfaces, disappearing, and then reforming. It left Cam with the constant impression that his father might at any moment vanish and then materialise unexpectedly behind him, emerging from the dark. Now was no time to worry about his movements, however.

When he'd completed one full circle, Cam's father returned to his desk and lifted one of the paper files from it. He turned, facing Cam, and extended his arm towards him, offering the papers. "Take it," he said. Cam complied wordlessly.

Continually glancing up at that enormous severed mermaid tail, Cam tried to focus on what he'd been given. His fingers slipped on the paper's corners as he tried to turn them, fumbling senselessly. He could feel his father's irritation at his incompetence without having to be shown any signs of it.

"I did not believe it at first," his father said. From anyone else, the comment would have sounded conversational, comforting. From his father, however, the words formed something colder, more pressing, testing and prodding at Cam with a subtlety that was surprising for such a large man. "But as you can see, these creatures are fact rather than legend."

Thumbing through the pages of the file, Cam's lips moved without speaking. _Wake up, wake up._ Each page warranted one cycle of the mantra, and his silent chant rose in pace as he flicked through the pages with increasing desperation. In the end though, there was no gag page, no words of 'YOU FELL FOR IT!' printed in big, goofy typeface on the thin white sheets.

Instead there were paragraphs upon paragraphs of words that Cam did not read, but got the gist of anyway; a clinical, detached drone, calmly informing the reader that their reality was not what they believed it to be. Of course, Cam wasn't their reader, so it was alright that he already understood his present reality and knew that mermaids existed. Besides, Cam was too distracted by the diagrams to read it.

Labelled up in black and white, ink diagrams separated the blocks of text, grainy like bad print-outs in a biology dissection class. Each one built on its predecessor, furthering the depth. The first started with the outside; the mermaid's tail, their upper torso, the connection between the two. Then the outer layers of skin and scales were stripped away in the following image, a depiction of their muscular make-up that was so macabre it was bland. The pictures delved further and further until individual organs were being examined. Slice here, look there - The perfect hand-guide to dissecting your very own mythological creature.

"What do you think?" Cam's father asked, catching Cam off-guard. His father had never asked what he'd thought about something ever before in his life. Now didn't seem like the best time to be starting.

"What do I think?" Cam repeated. "That you're nuts, maybe? That this is the sickest practical joke anyone has ever played on me?" That seemed like something someone who was ignorant of mermaids would say. It did not, however, sound like something Cam would say to his father. He wouldn't normally dare be that rude.

"Cam," his father said, straightening. In response Cam drew backwards, his shoulders hunching over as he dug his hands into his pockets and looked elsewhere, anywhere but at his father's eyes. "We don't have time for your games."

Anyone else, Cam would have snapped something back, probably something insulting. With his father, he kept quiet.

"Preferably, you wouldn't need to know about this. You've never shown much promise in the area, but the situation has called for your involvement," his father said, reeling off the information so quickly that Cam barely caught it, and yet his articulation was flawless. "This is what I do as a living, Cam."

Blinking back at him, Cam responded with the first thing that came into his head. "Please do not tell me you're a mermaid, dad. What will the kids at school think if I tell them my father spends his days threading sea-shells in his hair and singing on rocks? I'll be the laughing stock of the school."

It was a stupid thing to say, and his short half-laugh was even stupider, but they both came out anyway. When he got nervous around his father, Cam always tended to make bad jokes. If he did the same with his mother, he got a pity laugh. With his father, no such luck, just a long, unflinching _look_.

Cam fell silent, bowing his head.

"I hunt mermaids," his father said. "Have done for years, starting just after you were born." He paused for a moment, waiting to see if Cam would say anything.

He didn't.

"They pose an immediate threat to the life of many, especially those at sea, and so a certain sector of the government employs people to hunt them down. It is not normally considered a family business."

"Right."

"You are being brought in, however, because I believe you may serve a use in my current assignment. Do you understand?"

Cam thought about his answer for a moment. "Yes."

"Good."

Neither said anything for a couple of seconds, the silence waiting, apprehensive. His father was testing to see if Cam would be the first to break, either by cracking a joke or being snide. Cam was considering whether or not it was worth it. In the end he decided it wasn't worth giving his father the satisfaction and stayed quiet, awaiting the rest.

"Australia has always been a hot spot for mermaids. Coastal towns with off-shore Islands especially. A couple of years ago, Mako suffered a large surge in mermaid numbers." His father paused. "We dealt with them."

Turning back to his desk, he leafed through a stack of paper files and then pulled one out, barely disturbing the neat, orderly arrangement of the pile. He handed it to Cam. "Do you recognise these girls, Cam?"

Cam knew who they'd be even before he looked. "Yeah, they're Miss Santos's nieces: Nixie, Lyla, and Sirena."

"They're what we call high suspect cases. Girls that seem to have appeared out of nowhere and have suddenly arrived on land, no connections or parents to speak of. They fit the usual pattern. People who know them often describe them as slightly odd." Cam's father's dark eyes inspected him for a moment, calculating, before he asked, "What do you think of them?"

"I don't know them that well," Cam said with a shrug. "They don't go to school so I don't see them all that much. They hang out at the cafe occasionally, and one of them sings there."

"Singing is another red flag behaviour," his father noted, nodding once. "An absence from the educational system isn't uncommon either. Their case is pretty much textbook."

"So you're really expecting me to believe that mermaids exist, and that you go around hunting them down?" Cam asked, laughing half-heartedly to cover up the dishonesty in his tone. He could believe it all far too easily, no matter how much he didn't want it to be true.

"I am," Cam's father said without hesitation. "Of course your mother isn't to know about this."

"It's okay dad," Cam said, putting a smile on with an ease that came from practise, "mum's always been cynical about vegetarians anyway. I'm sure she'd be cool with it."

Unsurprisingly, his father didn't laugh. "Your mother will be expecting us upstairs," he said instead, glancing up at the staircase as he did so. "I will discuss this with you again after dinner. You have until then to think about what I've said. When we return, I want an answer."

"An answer?" Cam echoed, blinking out of his absent stare to look at his father and the black of his eyes.

"As to whether or not you are willing to help me."

"Oh, right."

Without another word, Cam's father walked past him, taking to the stairs. "Turn the light off behind you," he instructed without looking back.

"I will."

Still not having moved from the spot in which he stood, Cam looked down at the files in his hands. A photo of each of the mermaids was attached with a paper clip, the metal half-covering their faces. Cam actually recognised the photos themselves as well; they'd been taken straight out of David and Evie's magazine article, the one in which they had unwittingly investigated and printed the mermaids' background. In their defence, they never could have known what that article would bring with it. And after all, who was Cam to blame them?

Taking one last look around the study, his eyes lingering momentarily on the mounted tail, Cam turned back to the stairs and flicked the light off, returning the basement to darkness.

* * *

Zac

The first thing Zac noticed was that he appeared to have been buried alive in coral.

He never managed to notice a second or third thing, because he was a little too caught up with the first. He didn't think that it was an overreaction to panic and completely lose his head, shoving his arms out at the tangles of blue, green, and orange that surrounded him.

It turned out, however, that the coral surrounding him hadn't just been piled on top of him willy-nilly. Instead it appeared that the invertebrate had somehow been manipulated to grow around him, forming a strong, enduring cage. Far from being able to break it, Zac found instead that his efforts to escape only ended up slicing up his hands. The red of his blood seeped out into the water, forming a murky cloud that slowly dispersed outward, fading in intensity but still definitely there. The cut stung like a bitch.

He saw no point in it, but Zac attempted screaming anyway. From what he could see out through the gaps in the coral, he'd been trapped fairly deep. The water was a rich blue, not the light aqua of shallow waters but not the pitch black of rock bottom either. It seemed unlikely that he would be found, his best chance resting in that of a diver passing by.

He'd been meaning to investigate how long he could survive below water for. Now, however, whilst buried in rock-solid coral, he wasn't particularly eager to find out.

Screaming again, half-heartedly this time and with a faint ringing sensation of exhaustion in his muscles, he tried to make sense of what was happening. He had no clue how he had gotten there, where he had come from, nor did he know who or what had buried him. All he knew was that if he didn't get out soon he was probably (definitely) going to die.

As the streams of bubbles from his scream tapered to an end, however, hope returned. A chunk of the coral broke away, then another, and through the gap Zac could see the sight of skin, then a hand. That hand tore away the coral, unhindered by its resistance, and gradually the cage disintegrated into fragments, freeing the merman beneath.

Upon his release, Zac discovered that there also happened to be a merman in front of the cage's remains; his saviour. Or at least, Zac thought it was a merman. They were ingratiated with a tail, as well as a flat, muscular chest that was definitely not female, and yet they were noticeably different from him.

Perhaps their tail had once been blue, Zac was unsure. Now though, a growth had covered the vast majority of it, an ominous black-green in colour. Where the growth was lightest, perhaps the scales had once been blue, but even then the colour was indistinct.

The tail colour wasn't the only difference. The skin of the merman also possessed similar growths, a mould-like substance running up his forearms. In patches across his chest, something else was growing, something that looked remarkably like coral. It was not a particularly pleasant sight.

Looking up to the merman's face, Zac didn't recognise it. The eyes were deep sunken and the skin was pulled taut over the bones, giving it a gaunt, unhealthy appearance. They were brown-skinned, with dark tangles of hair and even darker eyes, no distinctive line between the irises or pupils. They were unnerving to say the least.

On the plus side, at least they were smiling. The merman gave Zac a boisterous grin that did not match their harrowing appearance and then reached forwards and grasped his forearm. He gave it a firm shake in a manner that reminded Zac of a handshake, and then released it. Following this, he pulled Zac into a quick hug, one that was more brotherly than sentimental, patted him on the back, and then swum off.

A little stunned by the bizarre and completely unexplained encounter, Zac stared after the merman. He swum off to the side, turning to face an underwater ledge that was covered in the same coral under which Zac had been buried. He then went about tearing at that as well, and a minute or so later another merman emerged. The new merman also possessed the strange growths, and the two embraced and then parted in the same way as one had with Zac, suggesting that it was conventional. With that, the cycle repeated, the newly released merman swimming off to help free others.

Looking around, Zac was finally hit by the enormity of what was happening. The underwater ledge wasn't just a small bank of coral, but rather a huge cliff edge that seemed to span for miles in all directions. Covering every inch of it was that same coral, and it rolled in lumps that looked like the mounds of graves made by coffins. From hundreds of these embankments mermen were all being brought forth, all up and down and alongside the ledge. There were thousands of them, and many more remained lying dormant waiting to be freed.

All Zac could do was stare. It was like witnessing something in the movies, an impressive zoom out of a newly discovered kingdom, rendered in flawless CGI. Unreal and totally surreal.

Turning his attention to himself, he brought his arms out before him and felt his throat constrict in horror, his stomach turning. His arms were paled, and creeping up their sides was that sickening green-black mould.

With shaking fingers he reached across to touch it, to dare discover what the hell it was. Just before he could feel it, however, a hand grabbed his shoulder and turned him, revealing-

Gasping, Zac sat up, drenched in sweat.

He'd awoken in the dark, panting breathlessly. First thing he did was put his hands to his arms, feeling for the mould that lay there. Nothing, his skin was as smooth and growth-free as it had always been, albeit slick with sweat.

Cursing under his breath, Zac exhaled heavily and put his head in his hands, trying to get his breathing back under control.

The dreams were his fault really. Actually, no, that was a lie- they were all Nixie's fault. Ever since Zac had been accepted as an official part of the mermaid's group, she'd been banned from telling him how evil he was, and how he was going to betray and kill them all. And so, instead of doing that, she had taken up telling him how evil mermen were, and how they had betrayed mermaid kind and tried to kill them all. Zac had actually preferred her targeting him; her tales of the merfolk wars were plenty graphic and completely uncensored. Even he'd ended up terrified of mermen, and he was one of them.

Sighing, he rubbed his nose and tried to wipe some of the sweat from his face. He'd been having dreams of mermen for the past two weeks or so, all of them terrifying, all of them setting his heart pounding and waking him up at god knows when in the morning. The routine had made him more than a little grouchy during the day, and he'd taken it out on Cam more than once. Perhaps he ought to ask his father if he could do something about it.

Sitting in the aftermath of the dream, however, Zac couldn't quite fight the feeling that something was different this time. Every dream before had always been horrifying, yes, often decorated with plenty of Nixie's gore-filled scenes given life, but they had all been dreams. He had woken up and known what was real and what was not, and could occasionally even get back to sleep in that knowledge.

Now though… he couldn't quite place what was wrong, but any chance of sleep was definitely out of the window. He felt unsettled, on-guard despite the silence and security of his locked apartment. The sensation was similar to that of being watched, a feeling that he couldn't quite shake, like someone was looking over his shoulder. The feeling of that hand gripping him lingered.

Knowing that he was being idiotic, Zac dismissed the discomfort with as much determination as he could manage at the crack of dawn and released the breath he'd been holding. He lay back down in the stain of his own cold sweat and rolled over onto his side, looking out at the shadows of his apartment, watching the blinking light of his stereo. On-off, on-off, on-off.

Somewhere in the cycle of electric blue fading to black and then re-emerging back again he slipped into unconsciousness and slept dreamlessly until morning. When he awoke, the dream was as good as forgotten, shelved amongst the others as just another nightmare. It was for the best; Zac had enough demons to deal with as it was. The last thing he needed was something else to worry about.

* * *

**A/N: So, if you didn't want to angrily call me a scumbag before, I bet you do now.**

**You just got dream-sequenced, baby!**

**Once again, feel free to drop a foaming-at-the-mouth rant down below, and I hope to see you all next chapter!**


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